The Treacherous Luo Song
The short, scrawny Summoning student stepped into the arena and summoned a Gloom Wolf Beast.
Mo Fan had seen this particular beast in class. It was clearly a juvenile — not yet fully grown — and not only was its combat strength nowhere near his own beast's, it was visibly two sizes smaller.
The moment the scrawny student walked out, his timidity was plain to see. The barely concealed mockery in the surrounding crowd's stares made him want to sink through the floor.
True to form, he lived down to every expectation. By the first round, a Shadow Element student had already run circles around him until he was bent over, gasping.
The scrawny student trudged back with a crimson face. "I… I'm going to train much harder," he mumbled. "Next time there's a… a competition like this, I won't embarrass any of you."
"Not completely useless — took out two idiots." Wang Liting, the long-faced one, said with a half-sneer.
"It's fine. We'll make up for it as best we can. Let me go next," Zheng Bingxiao said.
Zheng Bingxiao's Summoned Beast was the Stone Demon Warrior — in raw combat power, it edged out even the White Armor Battle Sting.
The White Armor Battle Sting had little resistance to Fire Element magic; if anything, its heat-conducting armor plating meant it would glow red-hot all over when exposed to flames. The Stone Demon Warrior feared no such thing. Fire was meaningless to it, and Lightning Element techniques fared no better — like scratching an itch through a boot sole, accomplishing absolutely nothing.
Its greatest weakness remained speed. The creature moved at a crawl, so slow that many opponents could sidestep its crushing blows without using movement magic at all.
Yet it possessed earth manipulation abilities that more than covered for that flaw, and with them it swept through four consecutive groups of challengers without pause.
"That's our class rep! Well done, Zheng Bingxiao, ha!" The backstage group erupted in cheers.
"Look at the faces on those Lightning and Fire Element students! Strutting around like they own the place because they're the strongest offensive elements at Basic Level — and now every last one of them is cowering in front of Zheng Bingxiao's beast. Beautiful!"
"That's 23 down already, isn't it? The other elements are absolute trash!"
Zheng Bingxiao stood inside the iron-cage barrier. Ordinarily an easygoing person, he now radiated a quiet authority that made no one dare act out in front of him — and it was winning him no small number of admiring looks from the female students.
The male students from the other elements, however, were in no mood to admire anything.
They had been thoroughly beaten. The fifth group was about to step up, and nobody knew whether this next wave would finally be the one to bring the Stone Demon Warrior down.
"I had no idea Summoning Element was even available at Basic Level. Now I understand — this element is completely broken. One person holding off our entire faction? What are the rest of us supposed to do?" The students in the stands had started buzzing.
One Summoning student holding off a full opposing faction — even the Lightning Element students must have been watching with envy.
"Summoning is only dominant at Basic Level. Who comes out on top at Intermediate is still an open question. Did you see the one who summoned that little Gloom Wolf Beast? That's what a lot of first-awakening Summoning students look like — they rely so heavily on their Summoned Beast that without expensive auxiliary equipment, capturing anything truly powerful is nearly impossible," said one of the more knowledgeable students.
"Still, within the academy, you're better off not picking a fight with Summoning students."
"Looks like the Stone Demon Warrior is starting to crack — can't hold out against being bombarded by this many skilled challengers in rotation."
"Yeah!"
Zheng Bingxiao finally buckled under the relentless rotation and was eliminated at 25.
"I heard the Stone Demon Warrior isn't even their strongest…" a student in the stands murmured.
"From what I gather, there's a Bone-Eating Demon. Absolutely vicious — probably the most terrifying Summoned Beast of the lot. Any Basic-Level Mage who doesn't bring a team of ten or more gets wiped on the spot."
"Let's just target the easy ones."
"Same here."
"My turn. The count's at 40 right now — if I'm on form today, the rest of you won't even need to bother." Wang Liting stepped forward, his face alight with breezy confidence.
Instructor Jiang Yunming glanced over and said flatly, "The higher the count, the more resources you receive."
"Then sit back and collect your share." Wang Liting raised his eyebrows at the group and strode toward the iron-cage barrier with his chin high.
Wang Liting wasted no words. He summoned his beast without ceremony.
Sure enough, what emerged was that exceptionally ferocious creature — the Bone-Eating Demon.
The Bone-Eating Demon had the body of a vulture, fleshy wings folded at its back. Its raw combat power might not have towered above the other beasts, but its ability to fly placed it in a class entirely its own.
Agile and cunning, it always struck at the most opportune moment — fast enough to close the distance before a Mage could complete a Star Trail, nimble enough to slip past any Basic-Level magic with ease.
If the Stone Demon Warrior was the kind of creature that simply shrugged off attacks, the Bone-Eating Demon was the kind that made attacks miss entirely. Against it, challengers were flat-out helpless.
The moment the Bone-Eating Demon appeared, every challenger turned into a rabbit waiting to be run down. All Wang Liting had to do was stand there and keep count.
"I heard the Summoning students have a quota — they need to take down 100 of us, or their resources get redistributed to the top-performing elements. Damn it, this Bone-Eating Demon could probably account for half by itself. No matter how many groups go up, nothing makes a dent." Li Junwei's neighbors in the Earth Element stands had started talking.
"Is there really no one who can put that thing down?"
"There probably are people who could. They just might not feel like stepping up…"
While the group debated, a somewhat heavyset face leaned in from the side. "Did you just say the Summoning students have a quota?"
"That's right — they have to hold off 100 of us," the student replied.
A sly smile crept across Luo Song's face. His gaze drifted toward Mo Fan, who had yet to take the stage.
"So if we prevent them from hitting their quota, the resources originally meant for them come to our Earth Element college?" Luo Song pressed.
"Of course — to the capable go the spoils. But we Earth Element students don't have any way to deal with that Bone-Eating Demon…"
"Don't bother thanking me afterward." Luo Song rose from his seat and began walking, unhurried, toward the challenger registration entrance.
"Thank you for what? What are you even on about?" the others muttered, baffled.
Luo Song kept moving. By the time he reached the entrance, he found the other challengers instinctively parting around him — nobody was eager to charge headfirst at the Bone-Eating Demon.
He slipped to the front without any trouble.
Originally, Luo Song hadn't intended to participate at all. A competition like this wasn't really meant for Intermediate-Level Mages like himself.
But the moment he learned it could affect what resources the Summoning students received, a scheme took shape in his mind.
"Luo Song — you're entering?" Dean Xiao spotted him immediately, displeasure flickering across his face. "Didn't you promise me you wouldn't go out of your way to provoke Mo Fan again?"
"I'm not provoking him," Luo Song said flatly.
Dean Xiao had nothing left to argue. Luo Song was technically still a freshman, and nowhere in the rules did it bar an Intermediate-Level freshman from participating.
With that said, Luo Song was already standing at the entrance.
*True — he had promised the Dean he wouldn't go out of his way to provoke Mo Fan, a fellow Intermediate-Level Mage.*
*But he had never said a word about Mo Fan's Summoning-element teammates. He could eliminate every single one of them.*
*Let's see how Mo Fan plans to cover that massive gap in the count with his worthless little Gloom Wolf Beast.*
"The resources meant for your Summoning department," Luo Song said quietly, "now belong to Earth Element."